# Chapter 570: The Inquisitor's Choice
The world snapped back into focus with the force of a physical blow. The scent of crushed mint filled her lungs, the smooth, thrumming surface of the flower a solid reality beneath her palms. Cassian's voice was a distant echo, his worried face a blur beside her. Her gaze was locked on the crater's rim, on the figure in black-and-gold armor, the glint of sunlight on a crossbow's steel. Time seemed to slow, stretching the moment into an eternity. She saw the man's finger tighten, the cold conviction in his eyes, the righteous fury of the Synod made manifest. He saw a corruption to be purged. She saw the heart of the man she loved, a fragile anchor in a storm of cosmic despair. The twang of the bowstring was a sharp, final crack in the air. But before the quarrel could fly, before the world could be shattered by ignorance, Nyra acted. She didn't think. She simply *willed*. Golden light, pure and brilliant, erupted from her hands, pouring into the flower. The light surged up, coalescing into a shimmering, translucent shield that bloomed in the quarrel's path. The bolt struck the barrier with a deafening chime, the dark metal tip dissolving into sparks of harmless energy. The shield held, a beacon of defiance against the grey sky, and in its light, Nyra rose to her feet, her face a mask of cold fury. She was no longer just a woman searching for a lost love. She was the guardian.
The silence that fell in the wake of the impact was heavier than any sound. It was a sacred, breathless hush, broken only by the low, resonant hum of the crystalline flower. The golden shield of Nyra's will flickered and dissolved, but the air itself seemed to shimmer, charged with the residue of her power. On the crater's rim, the Inquisitor who had fired stared at his empty, smoking crossbow, his face a canvas of disbelief. His comrades, a half-dozen figures in the stark livery of the Radiant Synod, were frozen, their hands hovering near the hilts of their swords. They had come to execute a simple, righteous order: destroy the aberration. They had not come to witness a miracle.
Cassian, finally shaking off his stupor, drew his own blade, the steel singing a clear, sharp note. He moved to stand slightly in front of Nyra, a solid, loyal presence. "Stay back," he yelled, his voice echoing across the obsidian bowl. His gaze swept the rim, taking in their tactical disadvantage. They were trapped in the bottom of a bowl, exposed. "You have no idea what you're interfering with."
"Nor do you, Prince," a woman's voice called back, cutting and clear. It was Isolde. She stepped forward from the line of Inquisitors, her own helmet removed, her pale face set in a grim line. Her eyes were not on Cassian, but locked on Nyra, on the impossible light that still clung to her like a second skin. "We see a blight. A source of corruption that must be cleansed. The Synod's decree is absolute."
Nyra's voice, when she spoke, was low but carried an impossible weight, as if amplified by the flower at her back. "The Synod is wrong." She lifted a hand, not in a gesture of attack, but of invitation. A soft, green luminescence pulsed from the flower, washing over the obsidian floor. Where it touched, the fine, black dust of the Withering King's influence receded, revealing the pristine, glassy stone beneath. The air grew cleaner, the scent of mint and fresh rain intensifying. "This is not corruption. It is life. It is a shield."
The Inquisitor who had missed his shot, a man named Brother Malachi, recovered his wits. His face twisted with a zealot's rage. "Lies! The witch enchants the very air! She twists the light to serve her own ends!" He slammed a fresh quarrel into his crossbow with a sharp click. "The Synod's wisdom is not for you to question, Isolde. Our duty is clear." He raised the weapon again, his aim unwavering.
Isolde's heart hammered against her ribs. Every fiber of her training, every sermon she had ever absorbed, screamed at her to support him. The Synod was the bastion of order. The Gifted were weapons to be controlled, and any uncontrolled power was a threat to the fragile peace they had built for generations. But her eyes, her own cursed Gift, told a different story. She saw the flows of energy, the currents of life. From Nyra and the flower, she saw a river of pure, verdant power, a force of creation and healing. From Malachi and the others, she saw only the jagged, sterile energy of their Gifts, honed for suppression and destruction. And from the shadows at the very edge of her vision, she saw something else. A faint, oily, malevolent darkness that clung to the rocks, a darkness that recoiled from the flower's light. Nyra was right. There was a corruption here, but it wasn't the flower.
"Malachi, stand down," Isolde commanded, her voice tight.
He spared her a glance, his eyes burning with fanatic fire. "You have been compromised, Sister. Your time with these heretics has poisoned your mind. Step aside. Let me fulfill our sacred charge."
"This is not our charge!" she shot back, her voice rising with a passion that startled even herself. "Our charge is to protect the world from the Bloom, not to destroy its only defense!"
"Defense?" he spat, gesturing with his crossbow at the glowing blossom. "That is the seed of a new Bloom! I can feel its power from here. It is anathema!"
He was wrong. He was so terribly, dangerously wrong. Isolde could feel it too, but what she felt was not anathema. It was a desperate, aching loneliness, a profound weariness, and a fierce, protective love. It was Soren. She didn't know how she knew, but the signature of his power, the raw, unfiltered essence she had sensed when they first fought, was in there, woven into the flower's very being. He wasn't a monster to be slain. He was a guardian, and he was failing.
The choice crystallized in her mind, not as a complex moral quandary, but as a simple, stark equation. To obey was to doom the world. To defy was to save it. Her duty was not to the Synod. It was to the truth.
Malachi's finger began to tighten on the trigger. There was no more time for debate.
Isolde moved.
It was not a thought, but an instinct, a single, fluid motion that erased the years of indoctrination in a heartbeat. Her hand flew to the hilt of her sword, the blessed steel whispering from its scabbard. She took a single, explosive step forward, pivoting on her heel. The blade, an extension of her newfound conviction, arced through the air in a flash of silver. It struck the stock of Malachi's crossbow with a resonant *thwack* of splintering wood and shrieking steel. The weapon was torn from his grasp, clattering onto the rocks, its quarrel spinning uselessly away.
A collective gasp went through the Inquisitor squad. Malachi stared at his empty hands, then at Isolde, his face a mask of utter betrayal. "You… you struck me. You defended the enemy."
Isolde stood her ground, her sword held in a guard position, its tip pointed not at her former comrades, but at the ground between them. Her breath came in ragged bursts, her body trembling with the seismic shift of her soul. The weight of her decision settled upon her, a heavy mantle, but it was not a burden. It was a liberation.
"No," she said, her voice ringing with a newfound conviction that echoed across the silent crater. She looked past Malachi, past the shocked faces of her squad, and met Nyra's gaze. A flicker of understanding passed between them. "For the world."